Clear blue sky.
High, high up, contrails track slowly across the blue like slow spreading rips in silk.
"Boss! base to Boss - check you systems now please top to bottom over - this is not a drill or whatever Boss, just do it fast. Over"
"Boss! what do we do? erm, over" Snowy. He's nervous thinks Boss.
"Boss! shit I got problems! QRAMS not targeting or coming up as able, fuck! Boss? Boss!" Flyboy is getting a bit loose thinks Boss.
"Boss! I got em! I can see them six Monkey bandits coming arcoss our 10 low at 3 thou...boss, what's up?"
Stay with it snowey thinks boss.
Boss takes a breath in, cliks his throat mike on and speaks, as calm as fuck.
"Hoooookay base what, exactly, is the bowl of hot brown shit you have for us poor old rocket targets today pickles?"
Boss sounds as cool as, well, someone who has been here so many times before - it seems to keep the kids from panic and makes him feel better too, but as he says this to base control he is frantically flipping through menues on his panel and HUD, and it is not looking good.
"BOSS!" snowey again "Do we engage"
"Chill Snow-cone, shut it and wait" want a carrot! "Base what the fuck, if you would purleeeez excuse my lang guuu fucking larrrge is going on?"
Snowey and flyboy could hear Boss arching his eye brow over the radio. They both smiled. One of them would never do it again.
"Boss, there is a monkey AWAC flying just over the border, and it's broadcasting a jamming signal and we don't know exactly what it's"
"QRAMS you twats! I am here with two fuzz balls fresh out of the burrows and they are jamming our QRAMS! the one thing that was giving us an advantage and we have now fucked that off into the breeze! Buckle up guys its gonna get lumpy and bad!"
"Boss we still have sidewinders on line! is that not good?"
Yeah if you were 5 years older and a fucking ace thinks Boss, but says
"Yep flyboy your right, Check your systems and..."
"FUCK, BOSS oh shit man, this ain't fucking happening"
"Snowy, Flyboy! one at a time what!"
But boss was checking like crazy himself, he knew all missile systems were jammed, everything was off line, and he could see the second jet of each of the three pairs of the monkey intruder group breaking off and coming up at them.
"Lets go to work. Or retire dead"
"RIGHT! you two! stop shitting yourselves and remember all the time I spent chasing your stupid fucking arses all over the sky showing you how to avoid a missile lock and how to get into gun range! And don't you DARE say you can't remember it because I am the best damn teacher in the sky and if you don't remember -you will not be home for wine and cakes with the girls in the canteen! you got that! you were taught by the best. That means ME - and my lessons work!"
"Right with you boss!" Flyboy, of course you are your on my six fluffball! thinks Boss.
"Yeah Boss! coming down fast, guns only then this time?" Oh crap snowey for christ sake this is not a drill or excercise, this is were you get hurt and killed. This is real life.
Boss stops these thoughts and flips his plane over on to it's port side and slides down at the three monkey fighters arcing up toward him, knowing that flyboy is tight on his tail and snowey is coming in hot from high up, he clicks on his throat mike and says, as calm as he can, considering he thinks this may just be the day he gets to have a drink in the bar of his nightmares-
"Ok, poodles we're going in guns only -please god tell me they are jamming there own missiles too or this, my dear chuckle bunnies, could be the screaming bunnies last stand. And I did sooo like being me"
Closing speed up in the high numbers, three on three, "but what about the other three bastards" thinks boss. "who is going to stop them"
He knows they should be circling high and waiting to pick off who ever lives out the next 10 minutes, but he can see them going off flat out on full afterburn, off for what?
"If I get through this, I will have to just catch them and kill them" thinks Boss.
"If I get through this..." thinks Snowey.
"peterrabbitsgotaflyuponhisnosepeterrabbitsgotaflyupponhisnose" thinks Flyboy, grinning in a very manic way
Back in the control bunker, Skit and Hazel sit down at a repeater screen. No one comments about the blood on Hazels lip and lapel. No one bothers to comment on Skit anymore.
"Oh the sneaky bastards!" says skit, fingering the hole in his ear.